Dr. Tarbell's Lecture.

Dr. Tarbell delivered a very interesting lecture in Sever 11, last evening, on "The Removal of the Elgin Marbles from Athens to London."

Previous to the removal of the marbles by Lord Elgin, he said, other spoliations of the temples and monuments were made. Private individuals visited Athens and carried off large statues and sculptures to adorn their own private galleries. On December 26, 1687, the Parthenon was blown up in the Venetian siege of the Acropolis and many antiquities of inestimable value were lost.

In 1799, Thomas Bruce was appointed British minister to Constantinople. The architect whom be had with him, urged him to have casts and drawings made of the remaining sculptures of the Parthenon. Failing to interest Pitt, the prime minister at this time, in his plan, Lord Elgin turned to English artists, but the demands of these were so far beyond his means that he abandoned his project for the time. On his way to Constantinople he stopped at Palermo where he succeeded in obtaining the services of an Italian artist with five assistants. With these he proceeded to Athens in 1800 to begin the work.

At this time Athens was a town of some 10,000 inhabitants consisting principally of Turks, Greeks and Albanians. The city was poor and squalid, with narrow lanes, and no taverns for the accommodation of travelers. The houses were mean yet they contained many historic remains. The Acropolis was a Turkish fortress and closed to the Greeks; here lived the Turkish soldiery which garrisoned the city.

The most that Lord Elgin was allowed to do thus far was to make drawings of these works of art and this was permitted only on the receipt of five guineas from each artist daily. In 1801 Abercrombie defeated the French and the fate of the Parthenon no longer rested on the result of the campaign in Egypt. At this time, De Hunt, chaplain of the British embassy to Constantinople, conceived the idea of moving the marbles themselves to London and finally in 1801, after some reluctance, gained permission from the governor.

With this permission the artists proceeded to take, down the sculptures, the most important of which were those of the Parthenon. Architectural specimens were also taken from the Propylaea, Nike Apteros, and Erechtheum. Between two and three hundred more were engaged several months in remov-these marbles from the Acropolis and lower city, so that when Lord Elgin stopped at Athens on his return to England be found two hundred cases ready for shipment. Some of them were lost by shipwreck in the Mediterranean and it was not until 1812 that all were safely landed in England. At first these were coolly received, owing to the people being engaged in hostilities with France, but finally when peace was restored they were favorably received. In his report to parliament Lord Elgin estimated the expense at L50,000 and besides this he was out of pocket L20,000 interest. He received for his trouble only L35,000 there by recovering only half his expenses. From this report it appears that more money was spent in this work than in the entire excavation of Olympic which lasted six years.